Serving order for dessert wine tasting

WINE TALK
1

Doing a dessert wine tasting for my group this Saturday. I’ve chosen the wines to cover the major styles of non-fortified and fortified. Have the following: a Vidal Blanc Icewine from Ontario, a Sauternes (2nd label of Doisy Vedrines), a Vin Santo del Chianti Classico, a Fino Sherry, a 5-year old Malmsey Madeira, and a LBV Port.

The challenge: where to serve the Icewine. Early in the line up due to its high acid and freshness, or later in the lineup due to its high residual sugar?

Possible Lineup:
Fino Sherry
Icewine?
Sauternes
Vin Santo
Icewine?
Madeira
Port

2

I would put it near the back to refresh and prevent those following from seeming flabby.

3

Given that the fino isn’t a dessert wine it should go first.

4

Yep. Fino isn’t sweet at all. If you want a sweet sherry, get a cream sherry or a PX. If you get a PX, put it dead last. Also, it depends on what Madeira you’re tasting - Sercial, Bual, what?

If you have a sweet Maderia, I would do Sauternes, Icewine, Vin Santo, Madeira, Port, PX Sherry.

If you have a Sercial, I might do that first or second, depending on what it is. The reason is that you would put the heaviest thing last, and the fortified wines always dominate the non-fortified ones. And fortified plus super sweet make it hard to drink anything else. Once you have a PX, you are pretty much ruined for any other wine. That just coats your mouth with sugar. The acidity in the lighter ones don’t really refresh all that much after those big ones and your palate is so overwhelmed, you lose any subtlety. I always put botrytized wines early on for those reasons.

A Madeira that isn’t too sweet is a hard one because it’s still fortified, but there’s also a lot of complexity to it. Depending on what the specific wines were, I might just sit and nurse that while everyone drinks everything else.

Let us know how the tasting comes out though.

And have some salted roasted nuts and hard cheese too.

5

Yes, perhaps misleading to call this a dessert wine tasting and then put in a Fino. That was a product of what was available and recommended at the shop I was at today. But to be honest, I kinda like the idea of starting off with a not at all sweet fortified to provide contrast and demonstrate the range of what’s out there. I love PX, but actually specifically avoided it because I thought it might be an overload after everything else (the shop I was at did have the Lustau PX though).

The Madeira is the Blandy’s 5-yr Malmsey, so a rich style.

I think I’m settling on the following: Fino, Sauternes, Icewine, Vin Santo, Madeira, Port.

6

Fino first
Sauternes
Port second to last
Madeira last.

The rest in your current listed order.

7

I like Andy’s thinking and yes, I kind of think the icewine would work in the middle—which one is it, Ryan? That may help my thinking.

skal,

Mike

8

Yes, I think the Malmsey last is a good call.

I’ll do you one better Mike and give the whole lineup, since I gather others are interested in the details:

Alvear, Fino, Montilla-Moriles NV
Chateau Petite Vedrines, Sauternes 2010 (2nd wine of Doisy Vedrines, which is technically in Barsac, FWIW)
Bergeron Estates, Vidal Icewine Reserve, Niagara on the Lake 2013
Fattoria Viticcio, Dolce Arriana, Vin Santo del Chianti Classico 2005
Dow’s, Late Bottled Vintage Port 2008
Blandy’s, Malmsey, 5 year old, Madeira NV

9

OMG, this thread was made for me. Or else I was born to post in this thread. Either way is good with me! [wow.gif]

One thing that would be helpful to know – what are the circumstances of your tasting? Is this a special dessert treat after you and your friends have a dinner of some kind? Or are you all meeting up specifically to enjoy the wine? Will you be serving any food with the sweet wines? Salty snack accompaniments, sweet desserts or both?

Also, a very important point to begin with: have plenty of drinking water on hand for people to refresh themselves and clean out the palate with, regardless of what food if any you serve with the wines. This is always good advice even with dry table wines, but especially important with sweet wines that coat your mouth with both alcohol and lots of residual sugar.

Now since the icewine poses you the biggest problem – icewine is extremely sweet but is also relatively low in alcohol and has an incredibly smooth texture. So taking into account the texture as well as alcohol levels and sweetness, I’d recommend the following order:

  1. Alvear Fino – universal choice with previous posters for good reason, the rich body and salinity and minterality will set up the other wines very nicely.
  2. Chateau Petite Vedrines – As a second wine Sauternes, this will be sweet but substantially less so than the icewine and will have a similar texture and ABV level.
  3. Bergeron Estates Vidal icewine – The icewine will be a step up in sweetness but will also have a very smooth texture and strong peach and apricot syrup flavors that will cleanse out the vanilla custard flavors of the previous wine.
  4. Fattoria Viticcio Vin Santo – A great contrast to the icewine, this will have a higher ABV and fuller body, similar texture, and loads of raisiny flavors and some toffee from the oxidation. Great setup for the fortified wines to come.
  5. Blandy’s 5 year old Malmsey Madeira – Madeira is a fascinating fortified wine in that it doesn’t taste like it’s as fortified as it actually is. It does have rich “cooked” fruit flavor that will follow the Vin Santo’s oxidized fruit flavors well.
  6. Dow’s 2008 LBV – And of course we have to finish with the Port with its high ABV rich fortified body and expected brandy and red fruit flavors

Enjoy the tasting and let us all know how it goes. [cheers.gif]

10

Took you long enough to get here, Sweet Man. :wink:

Yes, do let us know how things go, Ryan. I’m of two minds to switch your 3 and 4—there are reasons to keep either order given that lineup. I haven’t had Bergeron myself (Tran?) but since it’s so young, it may have requisite acid to act as a “sorbet” for the last two. OTOH the “building” idea has a lot of merit too, i.e. keep the order as you have it.

Bonne chance,

Mike

11

Whatever you do, put the Madeira last. Trust me on that one.

12

Ice wine and vin santo are usually less complex than Sauternes, so I’d be inclined to put them ahead of it, though the sweetness level could militate against that, depending on the wines.

The order in the middle of the line-up is probably going to be a crap shoot, though. Hard to predict.

Madeira last does seem intuitively right to me, even though it’s less powerful than Port.

Please tell me you won’t be serving these with sweet desserts.

13

This is an extremely challenging set of wines to put in any order. I normally want to go least to most sweet, but those fortifieds are palate killers. Even the Fino will destroy people’s impressions of the next couple of wines, and if each person is using only one glass, they’ll need to be cleaned (not just rinsed with wine, even if multiple times) after the Fino. That yeasty aroma and flavor lingers immensely in the glass and on the palate. Personally, I’d leave out the Fino entirely and go Sauternes, Vin Santo, Icewine, Port, Madeira. The Madeira will be less sweet than some of the previous wines, but that might be refreshing after tasting all of those intensely sweet wines. My advice on omitting the Fino is based on several tastings I’ve done that included Fino where I could watch many people’s reactions and talk to them about how it worked. Fino is best on its own or in a lineup of exclusively other fortifieds. I said the same thing a while back when someone was asking about where to place a Fino in a tasting, and he had the same result I always have.

14

Very thoughtful post, I appreciate your effort.